It is better to be wise after the event than never to be wise at all. And since the Labour Party did not draw the correct lessons from the rise and fall of the Poll Tax, this article which wisely warns of the consequences is still relevant. As it notes, Poll Tax was a breach of the Anglo-Saxon tradition of taxing things, not people; taxing things that people do, buy, own etc. but not taxing people as people.
by Jack Lane (March 1988)
Accountability and the Rates - Council Tenants
The main argument put forward by the government to justify the Poll Tax is that the present system leads to a lack of accountability of local authorities. The authorities which are always singled out to illustrate this are inner city authorities which have a very high number of council tenants, and there is a simple reform which would change tenants' attitudes to rates and bring about all the accountability that is possible in this area. This is to present the tenants with their annual rates bill, as happens automatically with owner-occupiers.
The annual rates bill concentrates the mind of those who receive it wonderfully. But under the present system, the rates paid by council tenants are hidden among the other charges they pay: rent, water rates, heating charges etc. It is amazing that the government appears never even to have considered this simple reform. The more one looks at government policies, the more one sees purely ideological considerations behind them. The poll tax proposals are the most blatant example of this.
Accountability and the Rates - The Family
The present system is essentially a property tax paid by families. One might expect the Tories to be prejudiced in its favour for this reason alone, because it certainly tends to preserve the family unit, in total contrast to the poll tax.
Family units generate a great sense of accountability and responsibility among members when it comes to dealing with financial matters affecting the whole family in every area from pocket money to house prices. And, of course, a family unit has a much better appreciation of what is involved in local government in all its aspects; its members are bound to have a more rounded view of the subject that single individuals who may never be affected or may never appreciate how they are affected by several local government services.
If the simple reform suggested above were introduced, there can be no doubt whatever that the present system would generate real accountability.
Taxing Property
The government seems to have developed the notion that because paying units will more than double, from about 16 million to 35 million, the poll tax will therefore be fairer and will lead to greater accountability. This ignores the fact that these 35 million already contribute in one way or another in the present system in a way that allows for fairness and accountability at the level of the family. This is certainly preferable to the state, in effect, laying down what people can do very well for themselves.
It is also very antisocial to remove a tax on property. This measure, together with continued tax relief on mortgages, creates a property-owning aristocracy. It is certain in any case that the temptation to tax property could not be resisted for very long by any government and a property tax would be brought back in a very short time. It is as well to remember that domestic rates were abolished in the Irish Republic less than a decade ago, and a property tax is certain to be reintroduced there very soon.
iv) 20 Per Cent
The whole accountability argument falls down at another level. It is accepted that even with full compliance the poll tax will raise about 20% of local government expenditure. 50% will come from central government, and the business rate, set by the government, will provide the remainder. Real power of accountability will rest more and more with the government as it will directly determine the major part of local government financing.
The government has made it quite clear that there will be poll tax capping as there was rate capping if it judges this necessary. This is admitting that the poll tax contains no automatic guarantee of better accountability of local authorities. Local government accountability will remain a matter for the eye of the beholder, except that the government will have more arbitrary power to implement its view of accountability.
It is hardly necessary to detail how unfair the poll tax will be as a form of taxation. There are enough Tories saying this to make it indisputable. One example from the Low Pay Unit illustrates the point well. It pointed out that despite rebates a single person with a net income of £2,382 will pay as much as Nicholas Ridley himself, who will soon be on £51,068 a year.
The Poll Tax and Civil Liberties
The unfairness of the poll tax as a tax need hardly be detailed. But it is necessary to detail the implications of the Poll Tax for civil liberties, so that the British people, and in the first place British trade unionists and socialists, realise exactly what is being proposed.
The poll tax is not, as some people undoubtedly suppose, a tax on the right to vote. Voting was originally a matter of counting heads, and still is in many cases. "Poll" is an old word for head. A poll tax is a tax on people for being alive and adult. The government prefers to call it by the euphemism "Community Charge", but it remains a poll tax - just as Income Tax would still be Income Tax if they called it the "Personal Remuneration Charge".
To put it as briefly as possible, the following things will have to be done in order to put this poll tax into effect:
1) Every adult of 18 or over will have to be put on a register. This will also have to include everybody under 18 in some form, in order to be able to put them on the register proper when they reach 18. So the register will, in effect, include everybody.
2) The register will have to be constantly updated, and on a daily basis, if it is to be accurate and take account of all deaths, marriages, births, divorces, remarriages, changes of address, etc., etc.
Cui Bono?
The computer industry is certainly looking forward to this. An article in Computing (3rd September 1987) says:
"In many ways it is hard to imagine a better set of reforms in terms of the increased demand for computer systems and hardware... (than the) billing of 35 million adults. Water authorities will also use the community charge in England and Wales. Local authorities will have the right to cross-check the register against other records... housing, libraries, schools, social services... Such cross-checking will only be realistically possible by use of computers... It will lead to something approaching 500 million transactions in England and Wales in each year... This figure is over three times as many as at present...
Non-compliance is inevitable. No other developed country operates a poll tax of the kind envisaged, so it is difficult to look abroad for comparisons... It will cost at least £100 million to set up the register and the new billing arrangements in England and Wales. The higher running costs could amount to an extra £150-200 million per year. Overall, the cost of running it will be two to three times the cost of the rates, though while both taxes run in parallel, this could be nearer four times the running cost. Benefits will not only cost more to administer, but they may cost the Exchequer more than the existing rebate system...
For the computer world inside and outside local government, opportunity is about to knock..."
The Threat to Minorities
It will be interesting to see how the government will decide how the following are registered on the computers: itinerants, tramps, seasonal workers, Irish migrants, squatters, runaways etc. And why should be the following be registered - who have very good reason to remain anonymous: illegal immigrants, political refugees, refugees from domestic violence, and many others who are quite entitled to their official anonymity. And of course there are prisoners, religious orders (some with vows of poverty), long-term hospital patients, the mentally ill, diplomats, etc, etc.
Some will be exempt, but they will have to be accounted for and registered in some way in order to be exempted and in order to be included if their status changes. And we are not talking about small numbers here. We are talking about millions of people.
It becomes difficult actually to imagine that the poll tax could even be set up because of the work and cost involved and it becomes impossible to accept that it is worthwhile in order to have a new system of collecting no more than 20% of local government expenditure.
Anglo-Saxon Freedoms
But there is an additional and even more important reason why the poll tax should be opposed. It should be rejected by all possible means because it is alien to the whole tradition regarding taxation in the Anglo-Saxon world. This tradition is one of taxing things, not people; taxing things that people do, buy, own etc. but not taxing people as people. A person must do something before he or she is taxed, a principle which is similar to and associated with the philosophy that insists that a person is innocent before the law until proved guilty.
Taxation, like law and the state itself, all of which are inseparable, is a necessary evil which has a negative role in the life of the individual. An individual may do anything, is taxless and free unless society through the state has good reason to make him or her otherwise. This freedom is defined by the lack of power of the state over individuals except that power which is ceded freely and voluntarily by them to the state.
The best citizens are those who are constantly challenging the state's laws and rights over them in taxation and other matters. This is obviously a very difficult concept for a petty-bourgeois mind from Finchley to grasp despite her libertarian reputation. In this she is not alone. The majority of people in the world would find the Anglo-Saxon attitude incomprehensible, and in so far as it was understood it would be considered downright dangerous.
The Totalitarian Temptation
In most societies, the state has a positive attitude towards its citizens in the sense that it takes it for granted that it is its business to decide what is right and what is wrong for them, and would see nothing essentially wrong with all that is involved in setting up and running the poll tax. The increase in the power of the state through the increased knowledge about its citizens would not be seen as a great threat. Quite the contrary, it would be seen as a form of extra security by the citizens as it is accepted by the citizens that the state by its very nature is there for their good.
In Britain, by contrast, the state is under a constant obligation to explain and defend its rights and powers to every variation in civil society and all classes, backgrounds, religions, nations, races etc. have to be taken into account by its agencies. Any tendency which adopts the blanket approach to civil society runs into trouble and has to retreat.
However, at the moment there is a great vacuum in the body politic caused by the absence of an effective opposition, and this has allowed the government to attempt the implementation of a purely ideological piece of legislation. The government has been allowed to succumb to the totalitarian temptation. Thatcher always had the potential for this, and she has been given the opportunity. The nearest the British ever get to totalitarianism is when a government is not effectively under permanent challenge from the opposition. And Labour has cried "Wolf" too often to be taken seriously now, when the danger is real.
It is conceivable therefore that the government will succeed in putting the poll tax in place. And that there will then develop a whole poll tax industry that will ensure its continuation. There are enough empire builders in local government to facilitate this and an unacknowledged but very effective unholy alliance could develop between these elements and the government.
Labour's Opportunity
Labour councils and the Labour movement generally have been presented with a great opportunity to undo at a stroke some of their recent mistakes and make a strong appeal to the majority of the population by opposing and defeating this tax. But they can do so only if they can convince people that this is not just more of the same from the Tories, but a qualitative change along the road to regimentation of the population.
And, it may be asked, what choice does Labour have? Are Labour councils and Labour councillors going to track down every person in their area and register them, constantly monitor them, allow that information to be on sale as Ridley said? In effect, will they do the state's dirty work? This is not information about the population that is to be just stored in a computer, this is to be useable information and therefore correct information and available information.
All this for a mere 20% of local government income! And despite their best efforts they could still be poll tax capped!
It was said of Wordsworth by his former radical friends; "For a handful of silver he left us", and we shall be entitled to say the same of Labour councillors who assist in implementing this tax.
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